Authentic Enquiry

Authentic Enquiry is an approach to learning which begins with the learner’s interest and experience, rooted in concrete place object or artefact and moves from there through a process of faciltiated knowledge construction, to a particular negotiated outcome which meets publicly agreed assessment criteria. It’s bottom up, rather than top down. It’s authentic because it is ‘authored’ by the learner and because it is ‘real and genuine’ in their life story. A special issue of the Curriculum Journal was dedicated to this approach in 2009.

An authentic enquiry is a Learning Journey which moves from purpose to performance. We all engage in learning journeys all the time. An Authentic Enquiry is a form of Learning Journey which is ‘scaffolded’ carefully and results in a product or a performance that achieves that purpose. Authentic Enquiries are a response to Bauman’s challenge:

educational philosophy and theory face the unfamiliar and challenging task of theorising a formative process which is not guided from the start by the target form designed in advance

Authentic Enquiry offers a way of framing an enquiry – whether formal, informal or problem solving in the workplace. It can be led by an individual or participated in by a team. The purpose of the enquiry provides the energy for the journey, learning power is how that energy is regulated over time – and how the learner approaches the identification, collection, curation, mapping, re-structuring and presenting the data and information needed to achieve a purpose.

Procedure for authentic enquiry – nine iterative processes

First, the student is encouraged to choose an object or place that fascinates her. Careful, ‘hands-off’ prompting and guidance may be needed from the teacher, to ensure that personal interest is strong and authentic. The rest of the process will be highly influenced by the integrity of this choosing process. (Sometimes the ‘object’ turns out to be a person, or event – it is its susceptibility to observation and the strength of the student’s interest and engagement that are important.)

Second, she observes and analyses the chosen object/place, both as a separate, objective entity and in relation to her own interest and reasons for choosing it. In this, she is developing her sense of personal responsibility. This initiates the cycles of a personal development process which is recorded in a workbook and in which the student, tutor and later others participate. It requires the student to develop the critical curiosity and strategic awareness necessary for independent learning, in the context of effective learning relationships. She is also developing a sense of herself as a learner who can change and grow over time.

Third, she starts asking questions: obvious, but open ones, such as: How did it get there? What was there before? Why is it how it is? Who uses it? How and why did they get involved? She is initiating and conducting a process of enquiry and investigation, driven by personal interest and shaped in turn by the answers to her own questions. She is exercising and developing critical curiosity. (All the time, the student is encouraged to reflect on her motivation, reasoning and identity as a motivator of her own learning.)

Fourth, the questioning leads to a sense of narrative, both around the chosen object and in the unfolding of new learning. Historical and present realities lead to a sense of ‘what might be’ both for the object/place and for the learner and her learning. She is becoming the author of her own ‘learning story’ or journey.

Fifth, the learner begins to discern that this ‘ad-hoc’, subjective narrative leads in turn to new, objective facts and knowledge. Subjective learning starts to be related to a wider, objective awareness. The learning becomes a ‘knowledge map’ which can be used to make sense of the journey and of new learning as it comes into view. She is ‘making meaning’ by connecting new learning to the ‘story so far’.

Sixth, with informed guidance and support from the teacher, the student’s widening ‘map’ of knowledge can be related to existing maps or models of the world: scientific, historical, social, psychological, theological, philosophical… This is where awareness of the diversity of possible ‘avenues of learning’ becomes useful. It requires the teacher to act as supporter, encourager and ‘tour guide’ in the student’s encounter with established and specialist sources and forms of knowledge

Seventh, the student arrives at the interface between her personal enquiry and the specialist requirements of curriculum, course, examination or accreditation. Her development as learner enables her to encounter specialist knowledge and make sense of it, in relation to what she already knows and in the way she already learns, interrogating it and interacting with it, instead of simply ‘receiving’ it, using the model of learning and ‘knowledge mapping’ skills she has developed through the enquiry. This is where the resilience will be tested, that will have started to grow through the responsibility and challenge of a self-motivated enquiry.

Eighth the student can forge links between what she now knows and institutional and social structures receptive to it: qualifications, job opportunities, learning opportunities, needs, initiatives, outlets, relationships, accreditation, publication… Initially, this takes the form of a portfolio or presentation, based on the workbook, making explicit both process and outcomes of the enquiry. Her learning has met its communicative purpose. She has created a pathway from subjective response and observation towards the interface with established knowledge.

Ninth In doing so, she has also achieved life-enhancing personal development by asking and answering such questions as: Who am I? What is my pathway? How did I get there? Where does it lead me? What were the alternatives? Who helped me and how? The outcome of this learning facilitates a sense of vocational identity – how I can make a difference in the world.

Authentic Enquiry is planned, constructed and enacted in accordance with these design principles:

It is reflexive

on its process

requires and stimulates critical and higher-order thinking

involves different forms of knowing

scaffolds and is scaffolded by learning power

learner reflecting on self as learner

learning guide reflecting on self and role

moves between self-assessment and public assessment

The practice models the principles

It is rigorous in integrating and assessing outcomes

impacts on knowledge and performance

assessment in context, not as determinant of process

produces evidence to build confidence in its efficacy

criteria for assessing process and outcome negotiated and explicit throughout

outcomes (also) assessed by publication/demonstration to community

It is in community

It is collaborative and conversational

recognising the power of language in the construction of knowledge

co-constructing learning and knowledge

creating (in preparation)

a community of understanding and openness to change

It is generative

It is Integrative

relating/uniting disparate elements

integrating the personal with the public and diverse world views and perspectives

moves between the particular and the general

connected to community identity, experience, understanding and purpose

[…] Authentic Inquiry is a particular form of inquiry-based learning, which emphasises the motivation that a pupil can get if hey;re allowed to choose their own topic, rather than have it decided for them. In the coming days, you’ll hear more about the exciting Yr.6 Authentic Inquiry Projects (AIPs), which will run for 9 continuous days now that SATS are over (hooray!). Pupils will choose they’re really interested in — maybe something the staff know very little or nothing about! — but their job is to help pupils conduct their inquiry, and reflect on their progress using EnquiryBlogger, a blogging tool made into a learning journal, developed at the Open University. […]

Martin and Simon,
In the research into learning power authentic enquiry has proven to be a profound way of enabling learners to ‘narrate’ their own pathway in learning, to identify their interests and to build learning power in the process. The process of knowledge construction – where the outcome is not determined from the start – requires scaffolding for most of us, and the learning power dimensions provide some ways to scaffold that learning. For example when you are doing knowledge mapping, you need your creativity and your meaning making, or when you are identifying and meeting negotiated assessment criteria you need your strategic awareness and a sense of your ability to change and learn.

I think one of the challenges for applying this in the corporate sector is in harnessing collective intelligence through the process, to provide business solutions. It’s actually about leadership.

Many good questions, which will need good answers as we evolve AE into a mature organisational learning tool.

I’m sure others will have some responses, but through my lens, the bridging from a cloud of issues towards convergence to collectively owned action can be scaffolded with practices such as Dialogue & Issue Mapping, and Conversational Modelling, with digital support from tools like Compendium.

These have been shown to be effective in myriad authentic, wicked problem contexts, but does require fluent facilitation, a practice engaging an intruiging mix of skills and orientations which we believe to be part of the future skillset for deep learning and sensemaking: listening, aesthetics, ethics, technology, visualization, narrative, coherence…

a. Is it the only way to develop the 7 elements of ELLI – or perhaps more specifically, how do we more fully demonstrate that ELLI elements/Learning Power will be developed using AE?

b. Does AE have to be collaborative? It seems to me it can be a solo activity.

c. In an organisational setting, I can see how ELLI will be used to identify an individual’s profile. How would you then use AE to develop Learning Power?

I can see that AE can be used to develop the learning power of an individual by asking that individual to carry out their own enquiry. This could be repeated for as many individuals as you wanted to develop.

But how might AE be used for process improvement, or wider organisational development?

Say you wanted to improve the recruitment process because it was too slow, or recruited the wrong people, or both? In current approaches to process improvement, you would bring together a group of stakeholders with an interest in that process. Could such a group find and implement a solution via an authentic enquiry?

In AE, you might begin by taking a recruitment advert as your starting point, although this might not be what some members of the team would choose (indeed, some people might not want to participate at all). Assuming you get agreement to a shared starting point, I see how AE works up to the point of generating shared questions.

Do you then give each person a specific question to investigate, or does everyone go off and do their own thing? Would this be acceptable in an organisation?

When you combine the answer stories, can you be sure you will get a full enough picture of the issues? I can see how the fish-bone step could be used to bring together all the material and to develop headings. A drawback of the fishbone technique is that it does not explore relationships and inter-dependencies, so perhaps another step is needed to ensure a consideration of the system as a whole takes place.

At the end of this process, do we have issues, or solutions? I suspect we are still focused on defining the problem/understanding the nature of the system, although this analysis may also suggest possible avenues for solutions.

So, I can see that AE is useful for a thorough investigation of the issues.

How do we then move to defining possible solutions, selecting a best fit and implementing it? Systems thinking would suggest a collaborative and iterative approach to this, open to emergence. The cycles of action and reflection suggested by Action Research would offer a way forward here. In fact, I suspect there is potentially a very exciting marriage to be formed between authentic enquiry and action research in the context of process improvement, provided we can find a way to bridge the identification of issues and the formation of solutions.

This reaffirms the need for a full understanding of systems theory and how leadership of change might work in these circumstances. Tim’s idea of the leader as facilitator/author of an emerging organisational narrative is very attractive.

It feels as if this needs a thorough discussion where we bring together knowledge of AE, Action Research and Organisational Development / Process Improvement.